I ended up moving because I started getting bitten sporadically everytime contractors did work on that vacated apartment next door. I did not have an obvious infestation per se when I left at the end of May but I would be surprised if the bugs didn't come back. The landlord's response was to blame me for the whole thing, which only served to get me out the door faster.

Anonymous on 04/20/2010

This four-flat building has had bedbugs for at least a year. I found them in my (3rd/top-floor front) apartment in spring 2009, soon after moving in. Spent the summer exterminating and was bedbug-free till the end of the year, when it became clear that the next-door neighbor (3rd/top floor rear, shares my bedroom wall) had them as well. He may have had them all along, we’ll never know.

By then they had re-infested my place as well as the apartment directly downstairs from my next-door neig

hbor (2nd-floor rear). The landlord brought in someone who threw around lots of poison dust and spray, but this elderly neighbor could not do the cleaning-and bagging protocols, and the rest of us didn’t have a way to help him.

However that neighbor moved out in mid-April 2010, and the apartment will soon be up for rent. The landlord has had that place exterminated, as well as mine and the one downstairs (though not the one directly downstairs from mine, 2nd-floor front), but in terms of long-term maintenance he seems to be treating it like a roach problem, having his guy come in once a month and spray. There has been no evidence of bedbug activity (i.e. no bites) since Easter weekend, but I don’t know if this method is a feasible and effective long-term strategy.

I’m posting this to give anyone investigating the apartment an idea of what they may be getting into. As of 4/20/10, there may or may not still be bedbugs in this building. The exterminator is not a legit bedbug specialist, though he claims to have done a number of bedbug jobs. He is moonlighting from his job at a larger pest-control firm and plays softball with my landlord. So it’s a step above a DIY effort as far as I can tell.